So this dumb conservative PAC finally, finally made the ad about Barack Obama's controversial preacher Jeremiah Wright that the McCain campaign didn't want to touch. Its very existence garnered plenty of media attention&dmash;and, of course, free airtime for the ad—but then the PAC had to actually put it on television. Instead of a targeted ad-buy in white swing areas, they just went national, sticking it on Sunday Night Football, last night's Saturday Night Live election special, and, uh, on the Rachel Maddow show? Clearly they didnt want to "influence the election" or anything with their little ad, they just wanted to annoy the hell out of Democrats while they're trying to watch their liberal shows.

The New York Times today runs five—five!—pieces on how many voters have somehow deduced that presidential candidate Barack Obama is a black man. Adam Nagourney reports that Hillary Clinton advisor Harold Ickes (he's also, it should be noted, a former Jesse Jackson aide) "routinely shaved off a point or two" from Obama's poll numbers to account for secret racistness. You can tell he was doing this during the primaries, right? Harold, people who won't vote for Obama because he's black aren't lying to pollsters. Because they sure as hell weren't lying to the Times reporters who went into the field to report on race.

Rev. Jeremiah Wright: "Nope. I'm not publishing anything. I'm not going on any book tours." [Essence via Wonkette, Previously]

Various people became quite alarmed when New York said the following at the end of a long article on Barack Obama's campaign and race: "In October, Obama's former pastor, [Rev. Jeremiah] Wright, will publish a new book and hit the road to promote it, an occasion that might well place the topic of Obama's blackness (along with his patriotism and his candor about what he heard in the pews in all those years at Trinity Church) squarely at the center of the national debate." Oh, EXCELLENT.

This is the New Yorker's new cover, depicting Barack Obama and his wife Michelle in the Oval Office. It accompanies a big article about how Obama maybe was not always about CHANGE but in fact may have been a skilled Chicago politician at some point. The cover promises to become an election flashpoint, and the presumptive Democratic nominee's campaign has already called it "tasteless and offensive." The caricature, according to the Huffington Post, "combines every smeary right-wing stereotype imaginable" about Obama. Ha ha, as if. Sure, the stereotypes about Obama being a flag-burning terrorist muslim and Michelle being an ashamed-of-America black power revolutionary are all there, but shouldn't Obama somehow also be an aloof Harvard elitist who hates "bitter" working-class whites? Instead, he's in rags and robes, with no jewelry or caviar or sociology texts and so forth. Anyway, the cartoonist said he's trying to mock the stereotypes, not perpetuate them:

Oh hey look everyone, Jesse Jackson said terrible things about Barack Obama while a microphone was on, and now, oddly, Fox News has this tape! Sean Hannity talked about it on the radio today, and Bill O'Reilly will be playing the tape tonight, on his show. OMG they are creaming themselves. Drudge already has the apology and no one has heard the tape yet! Reportedly, the Reverend is upset that Obama "talks down to black people on matters of faith," and then, more colorfully, he says he wants to rip Obama's nuts off. Maybe? "Hannity would not say 'nuts,' but based on his description (portion of the male anatomy beginning with an 'n') I believe that's the word he was going for." So this is basically great news for everyone!

A Dallas man has been sentenced to 35 years in prison for spitting at a cop. He was charged with assault with a deadly weapon, because he's HIV-positive. So his spit is made of death!!! Except, uh... we were taught many years ago that much as you can't get pregnant from oral sex, you can't actually get the AIDS from fucking spit. Look, here's the CDC:

West Virginia just keeps outdoing itself! The state—which is separate from regular Virginia because they used to like black people—is expected to overwhelmingly support Hillary Clinton in tonight's primary. Because Senator Clinton has been quite effective in drumming up support among older, blue-collar voters, yes, but also because Barack Obama is a Muslim and a terrorist who will enslave the white race and probably suicide bomb the White House. In the clip above, a voter explains that she can't support a Muslim. The reporter half-assedly attempts to correct her. Our voter will have none of it. Doesn't anyone remember Barack Obama's crazy black Christian preacher? There's more!

Local politicians say it will take more than a well-decorated storefront for Obama, the Illinois senator, to make headway. "He's going to have to visit," says Bob Pasley, who adds that Obama should come prepared to answer "tough questions," including some about his religion.

"Is he Islamic or is he not?" Pasley says of Obama, who is Christian. "I know he's tried to talk about it but he hasn't looked anybody in Wayne in the eye and told them."

Do you hate everyone around you? If so, you may wish to download one of Slate's political ringtones. No, seriously. This is what they're doing. Ringtones made of soundbytes taken from the never-ending 2008 primary elections. Like Hillary's odd laugh, John McCain calling someone a jerk, and "Yes We Can!" If you download these to your phone, you will get beaten up. But! They forgot a couple! Like, all the good ones, basically. Allow us:

Reverend Jeremiah Wright, Barack Obama's controversial former preacher, spent the weekend on media blitz, and the end result is that the press doesn't really like him. Except where before they were just harping on him because it was a great, easy story, now it's personal, because Wright expressed deep disdain for the entire journalistic class during each of last weekend's appearances. NOT DONE, REVEREND. You're supposed to be all penitent and you're expected to curtsy to whichever 60 Minutes dinosaur they unfreeze to drag out your meek apology. But Errol Louis in the Daily News—alarmed though he is that Wright acted at the Press Club "as if nobody in the room was learned enough to ask him a question"—did discover that Wright was actually invited to the Press Club by an enthusiastic Hillary Clinton supporter. Barbara Reynolds voted for Clinton in Maryland, criticizes Obama on her blog, and "organized" the Wright event at the Press Club. Hah. Well, if Obama's "scary" black preacher actually dooms his candidacy, we'll happily join the "god damn America" bandwagon, but that will probably surprise no one. After the jump, the Daily Show's bit on Wright's weekend performance. Stewart's "I'm scared of the black man" routine gets less funny every time he employs it but the clips are decidedly enjoyable.